The German Classics of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries Volume Xii Part 54

"I understand him perfectly."

"But he can't marry her."

"No."

"His purpose, then?"

"A wide field, Luise."

This was the day after the wedding. Three days later came a scribbled little card from Munich, with all the names on it indicated by two letters only. "Dear mama: This morning we visited the Pinakothek.

Geert wanted to go over to the other museum, too, the name of which I will not mention here, because I am in doubt about the right way to spell it, and I dislike to ask him. I must say, he is angelic to me and explains everything. Generally speaking, everything is very beautiful, but it's a strain. In Italy it will probably slacken somewhat and get better. We are lodging at the 'Four Seasons,' which fact gave Geert occasion to remark to me, that 'outside it was autumn, but in me he was having spring.' I consider that a very graceful compliment. He is really very attentive. To be sure, I have to be attentive, too, especially when he says something or is giving me an explanation. Besides, he knows everything so well that he doesn't even need to consult a guide book. He delights to talk of you two, especially mama. He considers Hulda somewhat affected, but old Mr.

Niemeyer has completely captivated him. A thousand greetings from your thoroughly entranced, but somewhat weary Effi."

Similar cards now arrived daily, from Innsbruck, from Vicenza, from Padua. Every one began: "We visited the famous gallery here this morning," or, if it was not the gallery, it was an arena or some church of "St. Mary" with a surname. From Padua came, along with the card, a real letter. "Yesterday we were in Vicenza. One must see Vicenza on account of Palladio. Geert told me that everything modern had its roots in him. Of course, with reference only to architecture.

Here in Padua, where we arrived this morning, he said to himself several times in the hotel omnibus, 'He lies in Padua interred,' and was surprised when he discovered that I had never heard these words.

But finally he said it was really very well and in my favor that I knew nothing about them. He is very just, I must say. And above all he is angelic to me and not a bit overbearing and not at all old, either.

I still have pains in my feet, and the consulting of guide books and standing so long before pictures wears me out. But it can't be helped, you know. I am looking forward to Venice with much pleasure. We shall stay there five days, perhaps even a whole week. Geert has already begun to rave about the pigeons in St. Mark's Square, and the fact that one can buy there little bags of peas and feed them to the pretty birds. There are said to be paintings representing this scene, with beautiful blonde maidens, 'a type like Hulda,' as he said. And that reminds me of the Jahnke girls. I would give a good deal if I could be sitting with them on a wagon tongue in our yard and feeding _our_ pigeons. Now, you must not kill the fan tail pigeon with the big breast; I want to see it again. Oh, it is so beautiful here. This is even said to be the most beautiful of all. Your happy, but somewhat weary Effi."

When Mrs. von Briest had finished reading the letter she said: "The poor child. She is homesick."

"Yes," said von Briest, "she is homesick. This accursed traveling--"

"Why do you say that now! You might have hindered it, you know. But it is just your way to play the wise man after a thing is all over. After a child has fallen into the well the aldermen cover up the well."

"Ah, Luise, don't bother me with that kind of stuff. Effi is our child, but since the 3d of October she has been the Baroness of Innstetten. And if her husband, our son-in-law, desires to take a wedding tour and use it as an occasion for making a new catalogue of every gallery, I can't keep him from doing it. That is what it means to get married."

"So now you admit it. In talking with me you have always denied, yes, always denied that the wife is in a condition of restraint."

"Yes, Luise, I have. But what is the use of discussing that now? It is really too wide a field."

CHAPTER VI

Innstetten's leave of absence was to expire the 15th of November, and so when they had reached Capri and Sorrento he felt morally bound to follow his usual habit of returning to his duties on the day and at the hour designated. So on the morning of the 14th they arrived by the fast express in Berlin, where Cousin von Briest met them and proposed that they should make use of the two hours before the departure of the Stettin train to pay a visit to the Panorama and then have a little luncheon together. Both proposals were accepted with thanks. At noon they returned to the station, shook hands heartily and said good-by, after both Effi and her husband had extended the customary invitation, "Do come to see us some day," which fortunately is never taken seriously. As the train started Effi waved a last farewell from her compartment. Then she leaned back and made herself comfortable, but from time to time sat up and held out her hand to Innstetten.

It was a pleasant journey, and the train arrived on time at the Klein-Tantow station, from which a turnpike led to Kessin, ten miles away. In the summer time, especially during the tourist season, travelers were accustomed to avoid the turnpike and take the water route, going by an old sidewheel steamer down the Kessine, the river from which Kessin derived its name. But the "Phoenix"--about which the wish had long been vainly cherished, that, at some time when there were no pa.s.sengers on board, it might justify its name and burn to ashes--regularly stopped running on the 1st of October. For this reason Innstetten had telegraphed from Stettin to his coachman Kruse: "Five o'clock, Klein-Tantow station. Open carriage, if good weather."

It certainly was good weather, and there sat Kruse in the open carriage at the station. He greeted the newly arrived couple with all the prescribed dignity of a first-cla.s.s coachman.

"Well, Kruse, everything in order?"

"At your service, Sir Councillor."

"Then, Effi, please get in." As Effi was doing as bid, and one of the station porters was finding a place for a small satchel by the coachman, in front, Innstetten left orders to send the rest of the luggage by the omnibus. Then he, too, took his seat and after condescendingly asking one of the bystanders for a light called to Kruse: "Drive on, Kruse." The carriage rolled quickly over the rails of the many tracks at the crossing, then slantingly down the slope of the embankment, and on the turnpike past an inn called "The Prince Bismarck." At this point the road forked, one branch leading to the right to Kessin, the other to the left to Varzin. In front of the inn stood a moderately tall, broad-shouldered man in a fur coat and a fur cap. The cap he took off with great deference as the District Councillor drove by. "Pray, who was that?" said Effi, who was extremely interested in all she saw and consequently in the best of humor. "He looked like a starost, though I am forced to confess I never saw a starost before."

"Which is no loss, Effi. You guessed very well just the same. He does really look like a starost and is something of the sort, too. I mean by that, he is half Polish. His name is Golchowski, and whenever we have an election or a hunt here, he is at the top of the list. In reality he is a very unsafe fellow, whom I would not trust across the road, and he doubtless has a great deal on his conscience. But he a.s.sumes an air of loyalty, and when the quality of Varzin go by here he would like nothing better than to throw himself before their carriages. I know that at the same time he is hostile to the Prince.

But what is the use? We must not have any misunderstandings with him, for we need him. He has this whole region in his pocket and understands electioneering better than any one else. Besides, he is considered well-to-do and lends out money at usury which is contrary to the ordinary practice of the Poles."

"But he was good-looking."

"Yes, good-looking he is. Most of the people here are good-looking. A handsome strain of human beings. But that is the best that can be said of them. Your Brandenburg people look more unostentatious and more ill-humored, and in their conduct they are less respectful, in fact, are not at all respectful, but their yes is yes and no is no, and one can depend upon them. Here everybody is uncertain."

"Why do you tell me that, since I am obliged to live here among them now?"

"Not you. You will not hear or see much of them. For city and country are here very different, and you will become acquainted with our city people only, our good people of Kessin."

"Our good people of Kessin. Is that sarcasm, or are they really so good?"

"That they are really good is not exactly what I mean to say, but they are different from the others; in fact, they have no similarity whatever to the country inhabitants here."

"How does that come?"

"Because they are entirely different human beings, by ancestry and a.s.sociation. The people you find in the country here are the so-called Ca.s.subians, of whom you may have heard, a Slavic race, who have been living here for a thousand years and probably much longer. But all the inhabitants of our seaports, and the commercial cities near the coast, have moved here from a distance and trouble themselves very little about the Ca.s.subian backwoods, because they derive little profit from that source and are dependent upon entirely different sources. The sources upon which they are dependent are the regions with which they have commercial relations, and as their commerce brings them into touch with the whole world you will find among them people from every nook and corner of the earth, even here in our good Kessin, in spite of the fact that it is nothing but a miserable hole."

"Why, that is perfectly charming, Geert. You are always talking about the miserable hole, but I shall find here an entirely new world, if you have not exaggerated. All kinds of exotics. That is about what you meant, isn't it?"

He nodded his head.

"An entirely new world, I say, perhaps a negro, or a Turk, or perhaps even a Chinaman."

"Yes, a Chinaman, too. How well you can guess! It may be that we still have one. He is dead now and buried in a little fenced-in plot of ground close by the churchyard. If you are not easily frightened I will show you his grave some day. It is situated among the dunes, with nothing but lyme gra.s.s around it, and here and there a few immortelles, and one always hears the sea. It is very beautiful and very uncanny."

"Oh, uncanny? I should like to know more about it. But I would better not. Such stories make me have visions and dreams, and if, as I hope, I sleep well tonight, I should certainly not like to see a Chinaman come walking up to my bed the first thing."

"You will not, either."

"Not, either? Upon my word, that sounds strange, as though, after all, it were possible. You seek to make Kessin interesting to me, but you carry it a trifle too far. And have you many such foreigners in Kessin?"

"A great many. The whole population is made up of such foreigners, people whose parents and grandparents lived in an entirely different region."

"Most remarkable. Please tell me more about them. But no more creepy stories. I feel that there is always something creepy about a Chinaman."

"Yes, there is," laughed Geert, "but the rest, thank heaven, are of an entirely different sort, all mannerly people, perhaps a little bit too commercial, too thoughtful of their own advantage, and always on hand with bills of questionable value. In fact, one must be cautious with them. But otherwise they are quite agreeable. And to let you see that I have not been deceiving you I will just give you a little sample, a sort of index or list of names."

"Please do, Geert."

"For example, we have, not fifty paces from our house, and our gardens are even adjoining, the master machinist and dredger Macpherson, a real Scotchman and a Highlander."

"And he still wears the native costume?"

"No, thank heaven, he doesn't, for he is a shriveled up little man, of whom neither his clan nor Walter Scott would be particularly proud.

And then we have, further, in the same house where this Macpherson lives, an old surgeon by the name of Beza, in reality only a barber.

He comes from Lisbon, the same place that the famous general De Meza comes from. Meza, Beza; you can hear the national relations.h.i.+p. And then we have, up the river by the quay, where the s.h.i.+ps lie, a goldsmith by the name of Stedingk, who is descended from an old Swedish family; indeed, I believe there are counts of the empire by that name. Further, and with this man I will close for the present, we have good old Dr. Hannemann, who of course is a Dane, and was a long time in Iceland, has even written a book on the last eruption of Hekla, or Krabla."

"Why, that is magnificent, Geert. It is like having six novels that one can never finish reading. At first it sounds commonplace, but afterward seems quite out of the ordinary. And then you must also have people, simply because it is a seaport, who are not mere surgeons or barbers or anything of the sort. You must also have captains, some flying Dutchman or other, or--"